Equal before law?

Equal before law?

A Christian family in Kasur is accusing a landlord and 12 of his family members of assaulting three of their women and ransacking their house over one of them being slapped.

The police have not registering the FIR against the men even though medico-legal reports have established injuries suffered by the women, says the family. The police said that the landlord’s family were “innocent”. The Christian family, was being “used” by the landlord’s rivals.

Bibi Rani, the mother-in-law of the injured women (aged 19, 26 and 35), approached Life For All office for assistance and narrated the whole incident, they were awaken in the middle of the night on June 3 when Muhammad Ibrahim, Muhammad Rafique along with their seven sons and four other men entered their house after scaling the boundary wall.

They were looking for her sons. Finding none of them home, she said they had started abusing her daughters-in-law and assault them. The men had then dragged them out and tore their clothes.

It all started with a herd of goats, owned by the Christian family, entering Ibrahim’s nursery and damaging about a hundred saplings, says Shaukat Masih, the husband of one of the women. He said he had had an argument with Muhammad Munir, Ibrahim’s son, when he locked his goats in a cattle shed and refused to return them.

“We (the three brothers and his sister-in-law) went to them again to request them to release our goats,” Shaukat Masih. He said he had told Munir off when he “misbehaved” with his sister-in-law and pushed her. “Munir slapped me and then I slapped him. He was furious, saying how dare a Churra ( Churra is a term used for sweepers, mostly the majority considers the Christians as untouchables) slap him,” Masih said. Elders of the area intervened then and persuaded Munir to return the goats.

Munir, however, filed an application at Pattoki Saddar police station against them. Learning about the complaint against them, said Masih, the men of the house decided to ‘disappear’ to avoid arrest.

The medico-legal certificates “establish torture”, said Masih, “My mother has filed an application but the police are reluctant to register an FIR.”

Pattoki Saddar SHO Haji Abdul Aziz said, “The Christians are accusing innocent people.” He said that the ‘goat incident’ did take place but added that “there was no truth to the allegation that Ibrahim and others had entered their house and humiliated the women”.

Aziz said the doctor who examined the women had recommended action under Section 337-F(1) (Punishment of ghayr-jaifah) of the Pakistan Penal Code “which is not a cognizable offence”. “That is why FIR can be registered”. The PPC section deals with punishment for injuries in which the skin is ruptured and bleeding has occurred (damiyah). According to the section, a court can decide a compensation that is to paid by the offender to the victim for causing such hurt. The offender can also be punished with imprisonment up to a year.

Life for All legal adviser Yousaf Shakuat Diyal filed a petition at the Lahore High Court to order the police to register a FIR for trespass and humiliation of women.
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